The game of baseball has been loved and enthusiastically supported for over 150 years. It remains one of America's favorite sports. Baseball fields in need of up-dating are being modernized and new state-of-the-art facilities are being built, nationwide, for both Major and Minor league teams. Baseball has become increasingly popular abroad and now offers viewer entertainment for millions of fans via television or live games in a growing number of international baseball parks.
Fans and players alike are captivated by unusual and often spectacular plays. Especially exciting are home runs, or clutch hits in key situations. Even hard hit balls not scored as hits can advance play of the game and provide added excitement. Every hit in baseball is an accomplishment for the batter, because in a confrontation between a good pitcher and a good batter, the pitcher is considered to have a definite advantage. That is why most hitters get base hits less than 30% of the time (a 0.300 season batting average). The best hitters generally achieve between a 0.300 and 0.350 season average. In fact, only a few great hitters in the history of professional baseball have ever managed to complete a season with a batting average of close to 0.400 or above.
Over the years, various batting methods and styles have been promoted by college and professional coaches and used by their players (and many others). To determine a desired batting style many factors are considered but there is one fundamental concept that is relentlessly emphasized by almost every experienced batting coach from Little League to the upper echelons of professional baseball. It is to swing the bat with two hands.
At first this may seem like an elementary concept but it is an increasing problem for hitters at every level. Today, more and more batters are showing a tendency to prematurely release their top hand from the bat during their swing. This is considered a bad habit by most batting coaches. The device described herein will help teach hitters how to involve both hands throughout the entire swing, thus increasing the chances of a hard hit ball, and improving other areas of their batting performance as described herein.
Watching historical films of older baseball games, one can see that the best hitters swung with both of their hands remaining on the bat all the way through the forward motion of their swing, even after making contact with the pitched ball. This generates more power upon impact with the ball, improves bat control, and improves discipline in selecting pitches at which to swing. In fact, many of the most prestigious hitting records in baseball are still held by "old timers" such as Ty Cobb and Mickey Mantle who used the two-handed swing. That swing was most likely a contributing factor in their success.
Since the Ty Cobb and Mickey Mantle era, hitters have been subjected to many new hitting techniques, such as the Walt Reniak theory of hitting. This theory actually promotes the release of the top hand from the bat during the swing. As the top hand is the control or guidance hand, these techniques suggest that control or guidance are needed only during the first part of the swing. Such advice makes it appear as if the top hand doesn't play as important a role as it does. This sends a very confusing message to young or inexperienced hitters who may try to emulate the Fred McGriff style of follow-through. This style is very unorthodox and uncommon, and would be very hard to successfully duplicate. I want to eliminate top hand release before and during impact so a hitter can maximize the use of both hands.
The premature release of the bat by the top hand limits the batter's control over where the ball is hit into the field. This usually results in a ball hit in an unintended direction and without much power, such as a weak grounder or a pop-up fly ball. The premature release of the bat by the top hand also gives the batter the ability to reach further out across the plate and swing at bad pitches (e.g., outside pitches that would otherwise be called "balls" by the umpire). By continuing to do this, the batter conditions himself or herself to erroneously perceive a strike zone beyond the actual area of home plate.
It would thus be desirable to have a device for training a baseball player to keep both hands together while swinging the bat, thus conditioning the player to swing with more power, better bat control, and better discipline in taking (i.e. not swinging at) bad pitches. The inventor of the methods and devices described herein was a professional baseball player who had the opportunity to play under the tutelage of some of the most experienced college and professional coaches in the country, coast to coast. He knows of no such device currently available.